Davis hit for ignoring beetle danger / County had asked for help removing damaged trees

Zachary Coile, Robert Salladay, Chronicle Staff Writers

Published 4:00 am, Saturday, November 1, 2003

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DAVIS SCHWARZENEGGER QUICK

DAVIS SCHWARZENEGGER QUICK

Photo: NICK UT

Davis hit for ignoring beetle danger / County had asked for help removing damaged trees

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2003-11-01 04:00:00 PDT Claremont, Los Angeles County -- Southern California officials, in a new round of finger-pointing as wildfires continued out of control, criticized Gov. Gray Davis on Friday for not declaring a state of emergency in a county that requested help last year to remove trees killed by the bark beetle.

A day after Davis administration officials and California lawmakers blasted the Bush administration for ignoring their pleas for a federal disaster declaration in beetle-infested areas, critics noted that Davis twice rejected similar requests from San Bernardino County for state help in cutting bug-killed trees. Davis eventually issued such a declaration, but not until March, several months after the second request.

"It's upsetting and offensive to me that the Davis administration would be pointing fingers of blame during this time of crisis," said County Supervisor Fred Aguiar, who chaired the Board of Supervisors when it made its requests for state help.

"It's particularly offensive to me in light of the fact that the Davis administration on two occasions refused the county's request for a declaration of a state emergency."

State and federal officials have known for years about the threat of the native beetles, which drill into pine and fir trees, infecting them with a fungus that can block the trees' vascular system, which carries water. Scientists and forest managers have long warned that large stands of dead, beetle-killed trees could become kindling for catastrophic wildfires.

On Thursday, the Davis administration released an April 16 letter to the Federal Emergency Management Agency warning that the bark beetle infestation was threatening three counties: Riverside, San Diego and San Bernardino. Davis warned that 75,000 residents of mountain communities were at risk and called for $300 million from the U.S. Forest Service and $130 million from FEMA to help prevent a looming disaster.

Davis spokesman Steve Maviglio criticized the federal response Thursday, saying, "I'm sure there are a lot of families without homes that are disappointed it wasn't approved."

But San Bernardino County officials said Friday that Davis had effectively done the same thing by refusing similar pleas they made, first in April 2002 and again in October 2002.

On April 23, 2002, the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors declared a local emergency because of the beetle infestation on private and public lands in the San Bernardino National Forest. The board also urged Davis to declare a state emergency for the county, which could free up more state funds to cut the trees.

A month later, Dallas Jones, Davis' director of the Office of Emergency Services, responded in a letter: "We do not believe the current situation in San Bernardino County supports a state of emergency." Jones also wrote that his agency could not find any state or federal disaster funds that could help the county.

In September, the county approved another proclamation, which stated the beetle infestation was creating an emergency in the Angeles National Forest. The measure urged Davis to declare a disaster and call on President Bush to make a federal emergency declaration as well.

In a letter sent to county officials in October, Jones responded that any declaration by Davis would not free up additional funds. Jones added that the Bush administration could not declare a federal emergency "because of the lack of physical damages due to the disaster."

But just five months later, the Davis administration reversed its position. In March, Davis declared a state of emergency in the three counties, accelerating logging of bug-killed trees and demanding that state Public Utilities Commission order the state's utilities to remove dead or dying trees around power lines. The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection redirected all its inmate crews in the area to remove trees in beetle-infested forests.

CDF spokesman Louis Blumberg said the reason the administration didn't act sooner is because nothing in state law -- or federal law, for that matter -- triggers the flow of money to prevent a disaster, only to respond to one.

"That might be an issue that policymakers want to look at," Blumberg said.

But preventative help is exactly what Davis asked for from FEMA in April when he said the beetle infestation was "beyond the capabilities of the state. " FEMA denied the request, saying the U.S. Forest Service was already diverting money to address the problem.

Davis, who joined Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger to tour a disaster relief center Friday, plans to appeal that decision. But with the governor- elect at his side Friday, Davis tried to downplay the controversy.

"We're not in the blame game here," Davis said in a call with reporters Friday. "Our task is still to put the fires out and put the victims back on their feet."

Davis refused to speculate on whether the lack of federal funds to treat beetle damage contributed to the fires.

Removing beetle-killed trees would have had little impact on fires that burned mostly through chaparral and brush. But fire ecologists believe the Old Fire, which has burned in the beetle-ravaged San Bernardino Mountains, has been fueled by bug-killed timber.

"There is absolutely no doubt that standing dead timber increases fire hazard," said Scott Stephens, a UC Berkeley assistant professor of fire science, who is researching beetle damage in the San Bernardino forest.

But Stephens added that it's doubtful than an extra year's worth of thinning on public and private lands would have stopped or even slowed the fires.

"Overall it would have had a very low impact because the extent of the fires was so large," Stephens said. "There's no doubt some of that work has been really useful. If they had started a year earlier maybe they could have removed a little more."

Davis warned that Southern California forests still contain many dead or dying trees because of the bark beetle infestation and said an assessment is needed to find a way to pay for removing the trees, which he called "too explosive."

Schwarzenegger echoed Davis' sentiments but said he didn't want to criticize anyone while "fires are still burning."

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